About Me

When not nosing, tasting, drinking and reading about malt whisky, I own one of Israel's premiere boutique coaching practices, specializing in small businesses and executive teams.
Trained in the law, I was an international law attorney and took part in Israel's peace negotiations with the Palestinians, as well as representing my country at the UN for parts of the negotiations on the implementation of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court. Later I was appointed to the military bench.
My favorite thing, other than whisky, is teaching.
You can contact me through the social media buttons above or by email: michael(at)maltandoak.com, replacing the (at) with an @.

Statement of Integrity and Guidelines

Malt and Oak is an independent whisky blog, offering my own views, opinions and news from the world of malt whisky.
These are my guidelines:

1. All whisky reviews published are of whiskies I have personally tasted and noted. Guest bloggers only write about their own personal tastings.

2. With the exception of official whisky samples, I accept no consideration whatsoever from any distillery, bottler, distributor, drink company or store for my opinions.

3. I maintain strict impartiality and objectivity in tasting all whiskies, not least when tasting official samples. Any review of official whisky samples sent to me will be so noted in the post.

4. I will accept invitations to tastings, events and official visits, and full disclosure will be made on any tasting notes and articles resulting from these events or visits.

5. Any sample received over 30 ml in volume is shared with fellow whisky bloggers. In any event, no sample larger than 100 ml will be accepted.

6. No advertisements promoting specific brands will be accepted.

7. I will answer any inquiry by my readers as quickly and as fully as possible.

8. Should I give a link purchase the reviewed whisky, it will be given free of any commercial interest. The link given will always point to cheapest selling price I found on the web. No commission is paid, nor any other consideration given, for such link.

9. As of July 2017, I serve as Douglas Laing’s Israel brand ambassasdor. As such, I will obviously not be posting reviews of Douglas Laing products.

Posts Tagged “Annual Releases”

Just a week into the new year, and it seems like the right time to taste a Brora distilled in 1983, the distillery’s final year of operation. In the picture from 1930, of course, is the Clynelish distillery, put out of commission in 1968 after the building of the new, modern distillery, after which the…

Three distilleries got the distinction of being “royal”. You’d think that that would be a guarantee of longevity for a business, but it isn’t. Glenury Royal was located in the town of Stonehaven in the Eastern Highlands, south of Aberdeen and near other closed distilleries such as Glenesk, Lochside and North Port, in the vicinity of Fettercairn…

Convalmore is a fascinating distillery, albeit one you don’t hear much about. The distillery never had its own bottlings, although Gordon and MacPhail regularly bottled whisky from the distillery in the Connoisseur’s Choice series. There’s a saying that “Rome was built on seven hills, and Dufftown built on seven stills”. Two of the seven are no…

The Brora was the only peated whisky in the Gone But Never Forgotten tasting, and was the anchor against which all other whiskies were nosed. Diageo’s Colin Dunn is not one to do things by the book, and his tastings leap all over the place between the whiskies in the glasses. There’s method to the…